NASA missed the ball completely

At the risk of being called troll-bait, I'm distilling this thread down to its
essentials and I find some merit here.

1) Ground-based lasers can make for low cost mono-propellant heavy-lift launchers.

Seems logical, worth pursuing in and of itself as a research program with low
initial investment but potential high payback.

2) Once item #1 is achieved, use it to produce a high-value publicly
subsidized orbital communications program.

Well maybe, unclear how effectively this competes on a cost basis to
terrestrial alternatives. This has been the bane of space-based ISPs in the
past. It requires orders of magnitude reduction in cost to LEO coupled with
infrastructure to provide timely and low cost system upgrades. Something that
is missing in the current space ISP equation.

3) Once item #2 is achieved, use the capital as the seed capital to boot strap
a privately financed space-based power system.

Again the devil is in the details. Cost vs terrestrial alternatives is the
primary impediment that come to mind.

4) Once item #3 is achieved, use the capital to boot strap a laser power
system for interplanetary operations.

A stretch. Mook has yet to convince me the technology exists without serious
materials science and space ops breakthroughs that you can't just throw money
at to solve. It might be achievable but the timescale seems to be to be in
decades to half centuries to achieve, with an industrial/scientific commitment
far beyond what we see today, including internationally. It's not just around
the corner, nor IMO inevitable even if item #3 is fully implemented.

5) Profit$!!!

Cost$!!!

At least this is a plan.

Dave

On Jul 30, 6:02*pm, David Spain wrote:
At the risk of being called troll-bait, I'm distilling this thread down to its
essentials and I find some merit here.

1) Ground-based lasers can make for low cost mono-propellant heavy-lift launchers.

Seems logical, worth pursuing in and of itself as a research program with low
initial investment but potential high payback.

2) Once item #1 is achieved, use it to produce a high-value publicly
subsidized orbital communications program.

Well maybe, unclear how effectively this competes on a cost basis to
terrestrial alternatives. This has been the bane of space-based ISPs in the
past. It requires orders of magnitude reduction in cost to LEO coupled with
infrastructure to provide timely and low cost system upgrades. Something that
is missing in the current space ISP equation.

3) Once item #2 is achieved, use the capital as the seed capital to boot strap
a privately financed space-based power system.

Again the devil is in the details. Cost vs terrestrial alternatives is the
primary impediment that come to mind.

4) Once item #3 is achieved, use the capital to boot strap a laser power
system for interplanetary operations.

A stretch. Mook has yet to convince me the technology exists without serious
materials science and space ops breakthroughs that you can't just throw money
at to solve. It might be achievable but the timescale seems to be to be in
decades to half centuries to achieve, with an industrial/scientific commitment
far beyond what we see today, including internationally. It's not just around
the corner, nor IMO inevitable even if item #3 is fully implemented.

5) Profit$!!!

Cost$!!!

At least this is a plan.

Dave

Our resident wizard, Lord Mook means well, and he's certainly aware of
the many technological issues. However, I agree with you that any SSP
needs more initial R&D investments and subsequent infrastructure than
indicated by Mook, in order to succeed on such a grand scale as he
claims.

A Selene L1 outpost/gateway could have been accomplished as of 4
decades ago, and at not 10% of the Apollo fiasco investment that
polluted Earth, got folks killed and the rest of us pretty much
nowhere, as having not benefited a soul on Earth outside of those
publicly funded on both sides of our bogus/perpetrated cold-war and
its supposed space race.

Selene L1 would be an ideal location for a substantial SSP that could
illuminate a dozen Earth receiving stations (up to three at a time),
but since it's not Mook's idea is why that'll never happen.

~ BG